The task of keeping Allen Stanford out of hell no longer falls on Dick DeGuerin. Clearly DeGuerin didn’t appreciate his client’s crusade to vindicate his name and reputation because he couldn’t even get the guy A/C.
Robert Luskin, a managing partner at Patton Boggs now gets the honor of leading Sir Al’s defense team. At the rate things are going, we’ll handicap the over/under on the number of attorney changes prior to 2010 at 4. Any takers?
Allen Stanford replaces criminal defence lawyer [Reuters]
Layoff Watch ’26: KPMG Cuts 4% From Consulting
We've got another RIF at KPMG, a consulting cull that went down yesterday (that's Wednesday the 29th for those of you reading this a week from now). Let's start with…
The Department of War Broke Up with KPMG, KPMG Gives Up Federal Audits Altogether
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KPMG Shoves 10% of Its Audit Partners Out the Door
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PwC Tells Remote Tax Staff to Get Their Butts Into the Office
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KPMG Plans to Hand Routine Testing Off to AI
Did you happen to see this WSJ article from the other day? In "In This Critical Part of Audits, the Accountant’s Role Is Shrinking Fast," we're given a look into…
In a Final Rule, Dept of Education Is Unswayed By the AICPA’s Strongly Worded Letters About the Meaning of Words
In the final ruling of a game of semantics that really chapped the AICPA's ass, accounting has not earned a place on the Department of Education list of "professional" degrees.…
Plante Moran Goes South of the Border to Acquire a Firm in Mexico
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Layoff Watch ’26: RSM Trims Down in Audit
Seeing a couple Reddit posts about a wave of "Business Update" meetings being forced on people's calendars at RSM yesterday. As we all know, "business update" is code for "you're…
SEC Says “What If We Just… Didn’t” on Quarterly Reporting
So that thing that started with a Trump shower thought last fall and that WSJ said would be happening imminently is, in fact, now happening. Catch yourself up on earlier…
Monday Morning Accounting News Brief: Claude Starts a Turf War With Consulting; An Article About How Much Big 4 Sucks | 5.4.26
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KPMG Plans to Hand Routine Testing Off to AI
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AI Will Be EY Auditors’ New BFF, According to EY
While staff in tax at EY US will soon be spending more time with their flesh-based colleagues due to a return-to-office mandate that requires them in the office for an…
ICYMI: According to This AI CEO You Won’t Have to Go to Work in a Year
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Another Early AI Accounting Startup Just Bit the Dust
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KPMG Brings Cheating Into the AI Age By Using AI to Cheat on AI Exams
The image is upside down because Australia. This story sounds like a joke but we assure you it is not. KPMG Australia has expanded KPMG's storied cheating repertoire by being…
Top Remote Tax and Accounting Candidates of the Week | October 16, 2025
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In a Final Rule, Dept of Education Is Unswayed By the AICPA’s Strongly Worded Letters About the Meaning of Words
The end of the ‘Always Available’ professional
Here Are Tax and Audit Salaries at Top 25, Top 300, and Regional Firms
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Friendly Reminder Not to Work Yourself to Death For This Profession
Saw this on the bird app yesterday and thought its message would be worth passing along what with 20 days remaining until April 15 and nerves as strained as ever…
Accounting Firm Abruptly Nopes Out of Tax Season Early (UPDATE)
Ed. note: An earlier version of this article's headline stated the sheriff is investigating. The Alexander County Sheriff's Office informed us they are not investigating, only fielding calls from the…
This Deloitte Office Has Eliminated Trash Cans at Desks to Make Staff Get Up Off Their Asses
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The IRS Decided to Troll Tax Pros For 10/15
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Don’t Grow Your Accounting Firm Out of Business! Break Up With These Unscalable Practices Now
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KPMG Thinks the Appearance of Independence is Overrated
The Radio Station is throwing caution to the wind in the UK, accepting a new arrangement with Rentokil Initial, that brings out the ghosts of accounting scandals past. Under the new agreement, the firm will serve as both the external auditors and take on internal audit work, working alongside the client’s internal audit staff.
Prior to the new agreement with KPMG, Rentokil’s external auditor was PwC and internal audit services were provided by Deloitte.
Last we checked, audit textbooks still state that external auditors are to be independent in fact and appearance but KPMG UK must have got their hands on an edition that was printed in auditor bizarro world.
Rentokil’s KPMG deal raises eyebrows [FT.com]
Firm Watch: PwC
This week we’re putting together a series of posts on the six largest accounting firms to give you an idea what their latest image seems to be based on the latest news and rumors we’ve read or heard about them. At the end of the week we’ll wrap up with a completely unscientific and probably unfair ranking which you will be allowed expected to take exception with.
We’ll start with P. Dubs because they seem to have had the uncanny ability to attract bad news lately:
Get the gory details, after the jump
• Satyam Fraud in India – $1b fraud, two auditors rotting in jail, Satyam throwing the Firm under the bus every chance it gets. This is the story that will definitely not go away.
• Discrimination Suit in London – GBP 40 million lawsuit, including alleged sexual harassment. P. Dubs is saying the lawsuit is “without merit” but at the very least there are a number of bigots working there.
• Rumors of PwC interns working 60 hour weeks in the New York office. Might as well give them an idea of what they’re in for, right?
• Chosen to take a suicide mission contract in Somalia to monitor the incoming aid
• Wage and hour lawsuits in California – Listed as defendant in three cases
• Huron Consulting Restatement – P. Dubs isn’t mentioned in this debacle. YET.
• Madoff exposure – listed as a defendant in over a dozen lawsuits.
As for layoffs, we haven’t heard much lately. There was a rumor that the PwC Denver office had let some associates go in the past few weeks but we don’t have any more details than that. Layoffs that have occurred in the past year at PwC we’re rumored to be of the stealth variety and not related to the recession which nobody really believes.
So, that does it for P. Dubya for now. What are we missing? Whatever office you work out of, send us the latest scoop on layoffs, performance reviews, promotions, pay raises, bonuses, juicy gossip, scandalous stories, etc. to tips@goingconcern.com and we’ll update the posts appropriately throughout the week.
Huron Consulting is Clearly Not a CPA Firm
Fridays are great for lots of reasons. They’re especially great for announcing bad news long after everyone has left work to get their drink on.
Huron Consulting announced late last Friday that the CEO, CFO, and Chief Accounting Officer were all quitting and that their financial results for 2006-2008 were being restated. The restatements result in total net income for that period being reduced by nearly 50% from $120 million to $63 million.
According to Reuters:
The restatements are being made because Huron’s board audit committee discovered that shareholders of four businesses that Huron acquired between 2005-2007 redistributed portions of their acquisition-related payments among themselves and to certain Huron employees.
More, after the jump
Soooo, regardless of what Huron is saying, the CEO, CFO, and CAO sounds like someone might have been taking kickbacks, which we totally understand considering the economy and whatnot.
Huron was ranked 43rd on Fortune’s list of 100 fastest growing companies just last year. They help their clients “face complex matters that demand extraordinary combinations of financial, technical, and industry expertise.” Clearly they are not using any of this expertise on their own books but whatevs, nobody’s perfect.
What’s also strange is that Huron really goes out of their way to put the universe on notice that they are not a CPA firm and do not provide attestation services.
“Huron is a management consulting firm and not a CPA firm, and does not provide attest services, audits, or other engagements in accordance with the AICPA’s Statements on Auditing Standards.” This is stamped at the bottom of virtually every page on the website because THEY WANT TO MAKE THAT CLEAR.
Btw, Huron’s auditors are PwC, who really don’t need any additional bad publicity. If any of you Chicago P. Dubs peeps got any inside info on this story, shoot it our way to tips@goingconcern.com. The stock is getting hammered today so we’ll continue to watch this to see how it plays out.
Huron CEO, CFO quit as restatements slash profits [Reuters]
Preliminary Analytics | 08.03.09
• UBS not to pay fine in U.S. tax settlement: reports Chocolate solves everything. [Reuters]
• Jobless graduate sues her college Worth a shot, no? [BBC]
• Goldman Sachs’ reputation tarnished – Being referred to as a “vampire squid on the face of humanity” certainly couldn’t have helped. [FT.com]
• HSBC, Barclays profits hit by surge in bad debt [Reuters]
• Bank Spy Scandal Widens – “A detective at the center of the Deutsche Bank AG spying affair says the international banking giant’s effort to monitor its critics was more extensive than previously disclosed in that it involved a plan to target as many as 20 people, including a number of investors.” We’re thinking that a spy scandal is probably the last thing the banking industry needed. [WSJ]
Review Comments | 07.31.09
• House Votes to Extend ‘Clunkers’ Program – We just printed more money. It’s fine. [WSJ]
• U.S. House Passes Bill Allowing Ban on Incentive Pay None of that printed money will be going to bankers. [Bloomberg]
• Court Orders Shorter Sentence For Ex-Qwest CEO – Might have been worth it had there been some adultery involved. [NPR]
• Nothing like a little shameless PR… – Deloitte providing accounting services, pro bono [Accounting Nation]
Tchotchke Wrap-Up
We know you’ve all been shaking with anticipation about the tchotchke results and frankly, we expected more of you. P. Dubs and Deloitte turned out squat and they’re the top two dogs, so that really dashed our hopes. Grant Thornton and BDO are zeros too. Are you all working too much? Regardless here are some results from our experiment:
Check out the schwag after the jump
Bandage container for those E&Y Dads who have kids that wear harnesses and helmets.
Radio Station magic 8-ball so the employees can get answers on whether they’ll have jobs in the next six months.
Rubik’s cubes are way more difficult than anything a 2nd year associate does.
Chairs that Radio Station partners with Napoleon-complexes sit.
We do things with so much quality we don’t bother using spellcheck.
Newt Gingrich Doesn’t Like the FASB
Congress seems hella determined to keep accountants from writing accounting rules. HR 1349, aka the Federal Accounting Oversight Board Act, which was introduced in the Spring would create a board that would consist of the chairs of the Fed, SEC, FDIC, PCAOB, and the Secretary of the Treasury.
This merry band of bureaucrats would basically get to slap the FASB around whenever they want. According to Newt “My head isn’t that big” Gingrich, a supporter of the bill, because of the FASB’S independence, politicians can’t torpedo accounting rules that are “destructive”.
More, after the jump
This gem of legislation has 14 co-sponsors, including seven members from the House Financial Services Committee, along with Gingrich and Paul Volcker. It has been referred to the Financial Services Committee so it will getting some Barney Frank lovin’ soon enough.
Say what you will about the wonks in Norwalk but we’re of the strong opinion that handing over the accounting rule bazooka to this board could possibly be the worst legislation since…anything Maxine Waters has introduced.
Congressional Bill Supports Federal Takeover of Financial Reporting [FinCriAdvisor via Jr. Deputy Accountant]
UK Court Decides it Will Leave the Major Lawsuits to the Americans
Big 4 firms dodge a bullet in the UK as the highest court dismissed a negligence lawsuit against an accounting firm that failed to detect fraud that brought down a trading company. The ruling will significantly limit the firms’ liability in cases “where a determined criminal drives a company to financial ruin”.
Doesn’t make sense to us, since if you can’t make auditors accountable, who the hell is accountable? Hey, whatevs, we’re sure the Big 4 and other accounting firms won’t be celebrating long anyway, since a ruling like this won’t happen in the States, which is where the serious money gets handed over.
Auditors win ruling over Madoff-style frauds [FT.com]
UBS and IRS Probably Have a Deal, No Toblerones Involved
UBS is going to name names, albeit not all of them, bringing us to ever so close to the bitter end of the whole IRS/UBS standoff.
All the gory details are expected to be released on August 10th, when hopefully everyone will kiss and make up officially.
The focus of the settlement will be around 7,000 or so accounts that are associated with offshore companies and trusts that are possibly tied to some financial shenanigans. Under the potential settlement, UBS won’t turn over any names until after September 23rd, which is the last day for offshore account holders to confess their sinful ways.
Deal Reached in UBS Tax Battle [WSJ]
Wanted: New Political Rhetoric to Pander to the Populist Masses
Wealthy taxpayers now have some legit data that allows them to give the finger to all the rabid populist outrage that’s been going around. According to the most recent data provided by the IRS, the top 1% of taxpayers pay more taxes than the bottom 95%. The wealthiest 1% picks up 40.4% of the tax bill while the bottom 95% gets 39.4%.
This amounts to pretty inconvenient data for lots of Democrats politicians who have been screaming for years that the wealthiest Americans need to pay more taxes.
Tax Burden of Top 1% Now Exceeds That of Bottom 95% [Tax Policy Blog via TaxProf Blog]
Ex-BDO Partner Won’t Be on His Boat after Plea Deal
Ex-BDO partners that were involved with the firm’s tax shelters are continuing to drop like flies. This time, Mark Bloom, a hedge fund manager and former BDO partner that worked in the Tax Solutions group, pleaded guilty to several charges.
Bloom agreed to forfeit assets as part of his plea agreement including a boat and two Steinway pianos which Bloom performed versions of his favorite songs on:
Check out the song selection, after the jump